Where's Dada?

My Biscuit baby just doesn’t understand the phone. He likes to hear people talk on it when we hold it up to his ear, but he usually won’t talk back, and he doesn’t understand that the people are far away.

The most recent occurrence of this was last night. Jeff had a media op at Duke in the evening, so he called about 8:30 to let me know he was heading home. Biscuit usually goes to bed between 8 and 8:30, but he didn’t seem sleepy at all. As soon as he heard the phone ring, he ran over, pointed at it and started saying, “Mmm? Mmm?” like he was asking if he could talk.

So I picked up the phone, held it to Biscuit’s ear then hollered loud enough for Jeff to hear me, “It’s Biscuit. Talk to him.”

As soon as Jeff started talking, Biscuit’s eyes lit up. He started looking around the room to see where Jeff was. Then he dropped the phone and ran into the kitchen calling for Jeff. “Da? Da? Da?

Then he ran into our bedroom, then to the front door, looking for Jeff. Finally, he made his way back to the living room where I was. With Jeff still on the phone, I tried to explain that Dada wasn’t in the house. “He’s still at work, baby. He’s not home yet.”

Biscuit looked at me for a couple of seconds with a serious look on his face. Then he realized. The Daddy Man was nowhere to be found … and he lost it!

He started crying so hard that his cheeks got red and there were big, fat tears streaming down his face. He sat down in the floor and put his hands on his head, still wailing. Then he laid on his back and rolled back and forth, still wailing.

It took that child 15 minutes to stop crying. He heard his Dada’s voice, and he wanted him RIGHT THEN!!!

Biscuit would not go to sleep even though it was well past his bedtime. Finally, Jeff got home about 10:30. He didn’t even have time to set his computer bag down and take off his jacket before Biscuit was standing at his feet with his arms thrown up in the air, asking Jeff to pick him up.

We always like to put on slouchy clothes when we get home from work, but Jeff couldn’t even change his clothes. Biscuit didn’t want to be set down for any reason. Jeff finally sat down in the rocking chair with Biscuit on his lap, and that baby didn’t go to sleep until about 11:15.

I told Jeff that he was not allowed to call our house EVER again!

Sick baby

Poor Biscuit is already on his fourth ear infection, and he's only been on this Earth for not quite 17 months. I had ear problems when I was little, so if it's hereditary, he can blame me.

But if you want to see the most pitiful thing ever, check out my feverish, sickly baby. He didn't want to sleep, but he couldn't stay awake. He didn't want to be held, but he didn't want to be in his bed, either. Check out his flushed cheeks and mussed up hair. He was feeling bad, bad, bad.

Poor little man.

Best Dumpster Dive Ever!

Okay, technically, it wasn't a Dumpster dive. I found it on the curb in a neighborhood coming home from a baby shower. But I have decided that this sliding board that I brought home was well worth the trouble of forcing it into the car.

Toddlerhood ... toddlerhood

Remember the theme song for the 80's sitcom "The Facts of Life"? I'd like to alter the lyrics just a little bit.

"You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have ... toddlerhood ... toddlerhood ..."

The good: I went to pick Biscuit up at daycare the other day. When I walked in, he was pushing a lawnmower around the room ... making car noises, of course.

As soon as he saw me, he dropped the handle of the lawnmower and took two steps toward me. Then he stopped and looked back at the lawnmower. I couldn't figure out what he was doing, but then one of the teachers said, "Are you going to put that up before you go home?"

As soon as she asked him that, it's like something clicked in his little head. THAT's what he was trying to figure out ... which do I do first ... run to mama or put up the lawnmower?

I was so proud when he walked back around to the lawnmower and pushed it up against the wall, almost like he was parallel parking it. Then all of a sudden, the four teachers in the room all started clapping and said, "Yaaaaaay!" Biscuit got this huge grin on his face. He knew he had done the right thing.

Then he ran to me, and we went home.

The bad: I have dinner with three girlfriends every Tuesday night, and when Jeff has to work, Biscuit comes with me. Biscuit has been struggling with the time change (who would think an hour could make such a difference?), he's getting some back teeth (which must hurt like crazy), and he's getting over an ear infection (or so we thought).

So after about 40 minutes at the restaurant, Biscuit was done. He started whining and crying and just all-around grousing. One of friends let him walk to the drink machine with her to get a refill. He thought he was big stuff walking on his own through that restaurant. And that helped for a little while.

But finally, I realized, we needed to head home ... RIGHT then.

As I was getting the car unlocked and opening the door to get Biscuit into his seat, he sat down on the sidewalk and wailed. Then when I reached for him, he laid down face first on the concrete. I have never witnessed this before, so I was a little taken aback.

But I knew he was tired and had a sore mouth, so I scooped him up and wrangled him into his car seat as he fought me tooth and nail. Once the car was in motion and the radio was on, he was fine. But boy was it stressful trying to get out of that restaurant and into the car to go home.

I do need to cut him a little bit of slack, though. When we took him yesterday for an ear infection follow-up appointment, we found out that his ear infections weren't any better than they were before he started the 10-day round of amoxicillin. The doctor prescribed a different antibiotic, so hopefully, he'll be feeling better soon.

All in all, we're very lucky. Our boy is in a good mood more often than not, so I guess he's allowed to have grumpy days, too. Let's just hope that those continue to be fewer and farther between.

Balloon Boy

A friend sent me a pretty flower arrangement with a couple of mylar balloons attached. And when Biscuit got home and saw those balloons floating around, he wanted to get his hands on them.

So I cut the ribbon on one of the balloons and tied it to one of his toys as a weight. It was exactly the right height for him to spend a good part of the evening batting at it.

He was having such a good time, I decided to video him doing it. Well, I tried to, anyway.

After I make videos, I let Biscuit watch them on the camera's screen. But the boy has gotten too smart for me. He remembers about watching the camera screen, so now when he hears the little tone the camera makes when I open it, he comes running toward me saying, "Bay. Bay. Bay-bay," wanting to see the baby on the screen.

So the first video is when he figured out I had the camera. The second video is when I made my way around behind him, coughed loudly as I opened the camera, and filmed him without him seeing me.

Hi-Ho Cheerio

A post from The Daddy Man.

I just wanted to go to the bathroom, for crying out loud!

But as I left the bathroom to get back to Biscuit, the phone rang, and it was Kimmy. We only talked for a minute before I made it back into the living room.

But that's all the time it took.

I rounded the corner to see Biscuit, shoulder deep in a giant box of Cheerios. He was helping himself using both hands.

Kimmy called to ask if I would give The Boy some leftover pasta for dinner, but I had to tell her that I wasn't sure if he'd be hungry for dinner or not, seeing how he had eaten several handfuls of Cheerios by that point.

It could've been worse. It could've been a cereal with more sugar ... and he'd still be awake.

Point and laugh

Sometimes you have to just point and laugh. Sometimes, you can even point and laugh while you have the video camera in the other hand!

Biscuit loves for me to build Lego creations so he can tear them apart. In his effort to knock a building over with his foot, he stepped right into the middle of it.

And when you watch the video, it's okay for YOU to point and laugh, too.

Biscuit's Books

Biscuit’s newest word is book. (Without the “k” at the end, of course. He hasn’t found the consonants at the end of words yet.)

He loves his books. And he has 58 million of them.

He brings them one at a time to us to read to him. He hands a book to us and says, “Book. Book.” And we say, “Yes, book,” and open it to the first page.

But sometimes we like to mess with Biscuit a little bit. We’ll open the book and just sit there. Then he starts looking back and forth between us and the book. Then he starts with his question voice – “Uhhh? Uhhh?” Like he saying, "Are you going to read this book to me or what?!?"

We finally give in and read his book to him. Sometimes he makes it all the way through. Sometimes a few pages in, he’ll grab a different book. But as long as he continues to love books, we’ll read pretty much whatever he wants.